Frank Schaeffer: The God-Believing Atheist

[cbayer]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christian-piatt/frank-schaeffer-the-god-b_b_5306149.html

Christian Piatt
Author, editor, speaker

Posted: 05/11/2014 2:24 pm EDT Updated: 05/11/2014 7:59 pm EDT Print Article

One phrase comes to mind, time and again, when I think of Frank Schaeffer: "THINK AGAIN." Any time I think I have a handle on things theological, he seems to find the thread, hanging from the edges, and gives it a good, solid yank.

Such is the case once again with his newest book, "Why I am an Atheist Who Believes in God: How to give love, create beauty and find peace." Just when it seems the delineations between theism and atheism, between believers and nonbelievers, is sufficiently clear, Schaeffer blurs even those lines, leaving us to wonder what it is any of us actually believes and why.

Frank Schaeffer is not one to deconstruct theology (or even the lack thereof) with some kind of sadistic joy however, leaving us to sort through the pieces. Rather he explores what I might call trans-theism, offering us practices, a vocabulary and a worldview that take us far beyond belief toward a deeply human -- and yet inexplicably transcendent -- experience.

I asked Frank several questions about his new project; here is what he had to say.

more at link

[Warren Stupidity]

1. At the risk of stating the obvious: he is not an atheist.

I do appreciate the veiled implication that the holocaust is what we get with actual atheism and the tired old canard, required for Huffpo articles on atheism, that "new atheists" are just the same as fundamentalists. He does have some creds on fundamentalism, having been one for most of his life. Atheism, not so much.

[trotsky]

2. What a steaming pile of horseshit.

Yeah, the rabid fundies are just as bad as the dreaded "New Atheists."

Rabid fundie: "HERETICS MUST DIE!"
New Atheists: "Hey, I wrote a book that criticizes religion!"

Yup exactly the same.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Which Frank Schaeffer is this?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Schaeffer

Another one? I ask because the Wikipedia one makes no mention of being any sort of atheist before. He seems remarkably obsessed with Jesus (as opposed to any other deity) for someone who calls himself an atheist. "What I know is that I see the Creator in Jesus or nowhere" sounds more like a Christian who has doubts than an atheist.

I also ask because the interviewee sounds pretty incoherent, and I'm surprised that someone who is known as a writer would sound like that. Could this be another Shaeffer that the interviewer assumes we have heard of (for something other that writing) and needs no introduction?

[cbayer]

4. I assumed it was the same one and can't find anything that would

contradict that. He has a history of struggling with his religious identity and does seem to be all over the place.

[struggle4progress]

6. It's the same guy, the son of rightwing theologian Francis Schaeffer

[edhopper]

5. As much as I am a

male lesbian, a big government libertarian or a progressive conservative.

[Humanist_Activist]

7. Well this guy seems like a charlatan, his book is a lie, just in the title.

Its like me saying that I'm a polytheistic Muslim, it just doesn't work.